Plot of M.C.
A Ghanaian couple, Mike and Sofesia Graham, immigrated from Ghana to New York City in 1991 after getting married. Five years later in 1996, they divorced immediately after Sofesia finds out Mike has been periodically cheating on her for another Ghanaian woman, Evelyn Nsiah, whom he eventually married. She soon gave birth to four of their sons: Michael, McCrillis, Royce, and Jemorie. They live together in Crown Heights, Brooklyn alongside Evelyn's oldest son and daughter, Evans and Joyce. Over a year after McCrillis was born, Sofesia gave birth to her daughter MaKayla but died of severe depression, leaving MaKayla to be placed in foster care with 11 other children whose bullying she was forced to endure through most of her childhood. McCrillis has also had a lifelong complicated relationship with his family at home and his peers at school. He first started boxing and training in mixed martial arts under an experienced sensei named Huggette Fenelon when he was six years old. MaKayla and McCrillis both attended P.S.189 from kindergarten through eighth grade, with McCrillis being just one grade ahead of MaKayla. In that school, they met Devon Delacruz, Haze Geetooah, twins Temera and Jaden Durand, cousins Cheyenne Williams and Rashein Smith, and Jonathan Castillo. MaKayla and McCrillis also do not get along with one another because McCrillis bullies her like her foster siblings do. When their school resource officer, Deputy Nadage Charles, stops MaKayla from committing suicide, Charles removes her from foster care and places her in child protective custody. Charles arranges a sit-down between MaKayla and McCrillis, and the siblings reconcile. As time passes, McCrillis and MaKayla want a job to do together after school. Charles introduces them to Lieutenant Brian Volckheim, who leads the Secret Youth Exploration Program (SYEP). He gives the siblings a babysitting job, looking after four-year old Erica, daughter of fellow upcoming SYEP officer Terrell Dockery. During this time, Volckheim has the siblings do some paperwork; McCrillis and MaKayla also meet Volckheim’s best friend Sergeant Felix Vasquez and his wife Victoria, who is pregnant with their daughter Sterlin; Victoria goes into labor after a baby shower. MaKayla uses her medical knowledge she studied years prior to help Victoria safely deliver Sterlin. But Victoria tragically dies of her injuries shortly afterwards. MaKayla volunteers to babysit Sterlin on her spare time. Meanwhile, Joyce got married and moved away while Evans left home without reason and was never heard from again. Several months later, McCrillis and MaKayla’s babysitting of Erica comes to an abrupt end; Erica is chemically fused with her dog Troy by Terrell and later euthanized in an alley by a mysterious man with a larger scar over his left eye. Terrell is imprisoned for his actions and cannot be released until he is 18 years old. Jemorie is shot dead by police who broke down the apartment door and mistaken him for a dog. None of the cops involved received any disciplinary action. MaKayla is assaulted by an MTA worker while on her way to babysit Sterlin and falsely arrested by a “cop”, who turns out to be a serial killer, Butch, in disguise. When McCrillis discovers this, Butch kidnaps him as well to keep him quiet. Barely escaping, McCrillis manages to free himself and MaKayla from Butch's grasp, and Butch is soon locked behind bars. McCrillis is congratulated by Volckheim for bringing the recent suspects to justice. Volckheim also reveals those paperworks were actually the official state exam to see if youths qualify to join SYEP, but virtually nobody passed and they only take the youth with the highest scores first well before they go for the ones with the estimated average score. McCrillis got a 70% while MaKayla got the highest, a 96%. However, McCrillis convinces Volckheim to drop MaKayla out and also not to tell her what he just told him. Volckheim reluctantly accepts, but only if McCrillis agrees to re-take the exam to get a higher score. He does but this time he fails. Felix helps McCrillis cheat in order for him to be accepted and kept into the SYEP. McCrillis becomes the youngest undercover agent in SYEP’s history. Felix earns 5,000 dollars a week in lottery winnings, a prize he personally gives to MaKayla, who by now is released from child protective custody so that she can buy her own apartment to live in. At McCrillis’ suggestion, MaKayla also decides to have Cheyenne and Jaden live with her as well. The latter two have been having relationship issues with their respective family members. Cheynne’s parents are homophobic of her sexuality and overprotective of her color blindness, while her older cousin Rashien is a bully; Jaden‘s older twin sister Temera is also a bully as well as a thief, though mostly because of constant peer pressure from Rashein. Temera and Rashein are also romantically involved with one another. They drop out of school to gangbang. McCrillis graduates P.S.189 and starts attending Transit Tech High School in East New York. He soon began coming to school much less often to focus more on his duties, partly because his classmates, particularly Dante McKenzie, bully him, resulting in McCrillis performing poorly in terms of attendance, grades, and exams. Meanwhile, MaKayla, Cheyenne, Jaden, Devon, Haze, and Jonathan also begin attending Transit Tech over a year after McCrillis. Cheyenne and Jaden get a part-time job together as retail sales associates while MaKayla becomes a medical volunteer in addition to her continuing to babysit Sterlin. Various tensions occur among them; the girls’ friendship is strained because of Jaden’s bossy instincts and Cheyenne‘s aggressive nature; Devon and Haze are also both failing at school; the former gets into an altercation with an unknown girl who later tried to get her brothers on him in revenge; the latter goofs off with his friends; Jonathan becomes affiliated with a Dominican gang known as Trinitario. - - -